run every league in every country - Is it possible?

I'd like to be able to start a new save in FM13 where I have every league in every country continually open to me - ie. my game world is pretty much exactly the same as the real life world.

Are there any PC specs in existence that could cater for this? Or is it just impossible.

If money isn't an object, would this do the job?

Computer Case : 1 x Cooler Master Silencio 550

CPU : 1 x Intel Core i7 3820 (4 x 3.6 GHZ) 10MB

CPU Heatsink : 1 x Corsair Hydro Series H80 (Advanced Liquid Cooling)

Memory : 1 x Corsair 16GB PC3-12800 1600 MHz (4x4GB) - Lifetime Warranty (DDR3)

Graphics Card : 1 x 1GB EVGA GTX 550 Ti SuperClocked, 4514MHz GDDR5, GPU 981MHz, 192 Cores, 2x DL DVI-I/ mini HDMI

Motherboard : 1 x Gigabyte GA-X79-UD3 (Intel X79)

Power Supply : 1 x Corsair 800W Gaming PSU - Low Noise

Hard Drive #1 : 1 x WD SATA-III VelociRaptor 600GB 10000RPM 32MB

Optical Drive #1 : 1 x Samsung 22x DVD Re-Writer/Reader /- RW- Black - Lightscribe (SATA)

Operating System #1 : 1 x Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64 BIT (Genuine DVD & COA Included)

CPU Compound : 1 x Standard CPU Compound Supplied With Heatsink

PCs that are a fair few years old can run it (very, very slowly), but the game itself can't handle it and will crash. A lot.

PCs that are a fair few years old can run it (very, very slowly), but the game itself can't handle it and will crash. A lot.

yeah, I have found this out the hard way. Runs at a decent speed for me for an older system, but prepare for lots of crashes.

yeah, I have found this out the hard way. Runs at a decent speed for me for an older system, but prepare for lots of crashes.

Even with a newer high spec system? Seems a shame if the game technically offers more than it can possibly handle whatever the system you play it on.... I know it's not recommended to load all leagues and all countries, but there's a difference between not recommending it and not allowing the option because it will cause crashes!

I've tried it on my computer (2 x 2,4 GHz Intel processors, 2 GB RAM, 250 GB of hard drive space); every league from every country plus all players from the database loaded. It worked, it didn't crash, but it was very slow (the save took about 2 hours to create, it took about 15-20 minutes to process through one day).

The game will not crash so long as you do not load any extra players beyond the large db, my all leagues save is currently in 2046 or maybe it's 2047 & it hasn't skipped a beat.

It is starting to slow down a little but nothing that isn't tolerable, a season will take about 28 hours to complete & I could probably shorten that if it wasn't for my llama ways.

3 year old i7 920 o/c to 3.8 with 6GB RAM btw.

The game will not crash so long as you do not load any extra players beyond the large db, my all leagues save is currently in 2046 or maybe it's 2047 & it hasn't skipped a beat.

It is starting to slow down a little but nothing that isn't tolerable, a season will take about 28 hours to complete & I could probably shorten that if it wasn't for my llama ways.

3 year old i7 920 o/c to 3.8 with 6GB RAM btw.

This sounds promising then. I was thinking the CPU will be the most important thing but you all mention the RAM - is this important for speed of game? I am looking at 16gb ram.

Another important aspect I'd have thought it the hard drive, I've gone for one with 10,000 rpm so it reads stuff from the hard disk quicker, ie. the skins, backgrounds, logos etc - surely FM more than most games relies on this info on every single screen.

I don't know though which is the reason I'm asking. Thanks for your help so far, sounding more promosing now too!

RAM (min 6 if triple channel or 8 if dual channel) & CPU are the key, I would avoid using 3rd party updates or add-ons as that just increases the chances of you encountering a problem as the game progresses.

Well FM is still 32-bit so RAM will never be essential beyond a certain point.

Anything above 4gb of RAM is not used no matter how many leagues are loaded due to it being a 32-bit game. The component that slows mosts games down is the hard-drive read/write speed which will still be a problem until manufacturer's perfect how SSD technology (still in it's infancy), so i wouldn't bother trying too hard to get the game running fast as you'll hit slow-down no matter how beefy your rig is until SI make the jump up to 64-bit technology. Once this happens, people with 5 year old rigs will instantly be able to run loads more leagues without having to upgrade.

It saddens me when i see people buying £1000+ PC's/ Laptops's to run a game that simply cannot be run quick. I suppose they're ready for the 64bit version though.

Anything above 4gb of RAM is not used no matter how many leagues are loaded due to it being a 32-bit game. The component that slows mosts games down is the hard-drive read/write speed which will still be a problem until manufacturer's perfect how SSD technology (still in it's infancy), so i wouldn't bother trying too hard to get the game running fast as you'll hit slow-down no matter how beefy your rig is until SI make the jump up to 64-bit technology. Once this happens, people with 5 year old rigs will instantly be able to run loads more leagues without having to upgrade.

It saddens me when i see people buying £1000+ PC's/ Laptops's to run a game that simply cannot be run quick. I suppose they're ready for the 64bit version though.

Thanks for this. I should point out I'm not paying a shed load for a laptop just to run FM - areyoumadman?! - but how FM will perform is one of the factors when I'm choosing certain components. I've been told a SSD drive is the way forward but am still debating this... it seems to come at the cost of lots of disk capacity. For example, what's better out of these two... a 180gb SSD or a 600GB non-SSD with 10,000rpm. (There's only a fiver in it)

http://www.computerplanet.co.uk/products/180gb-corsair-force-series-3-ssd-sata-iii,-read-550mb-s,-write-515mb-s-silent-2085089.html

http://www.computerplanet.co.uk/products/wd-sata-iii-velociraptor-600gb-10000rpm-32mb-2071726.html

you could possibly buy two of those hard drives and run them as RAID 0 (Redundant Array of Independent Disks (originally and more informally "...Inexpensive Disks") , you will notice the difference compared to just having one drive.

You could also buy yourself a SSD drive to run windows, with the drives operating in RAID as a separate partition for everything else, program files, saves, pictures, documents, etc.....

the faster the processor the faster the game will run. i run a i7 950 o/c'd to 4.0 ghz and a very good gaming setup system and the games flies along. i usually run around 15-20 leagues with a large database. i could run more but i like to have a very fast running game. i noticed a large difference just when overclocking my i7 950. hard drive speed has nothing to do with it. However the suggestion to run a ssd for windows and a large hd for normal files is a good one. i use a 250 gb ssd for my windows and 2x 2tb black caviar hdd for my files. works a treat. I've never tried to run all the leagues as it seems kinda pointless but i might have to give it a go to see how my machine handles it..

Drive speed (on platter HD's) effect large data files, the quicker you can get the information to ram and your processor, means less wait time for information to load. This would be why you would notice a difference running windows on a SSD, as there is zero seek time and (dependant on drive) very quick transfer rate. The reason they are not used as a more accessable read and write drive is that they deteriate or become slower the more times the partitions have to be written to.

Running HD's in RAID0 is an efficient and cheap way of getting large HD space with quicker read write times.

I wonder if there are any plans to take FM to 64 bit

Thanks for all the advice guys. I've bitten the bullet and bought my new PC now, it's an i7 3770K - (4 x 3.5 GHZ) - Ivy Bridge, with the Velociraptor 600gb HD. Didn't go for SSD in the end but many reviews tell me the Velociraptor is very close to in speed to SSD's, and one of the best.

I get it delivered in a couple of weeks and can't wait! Really appreciate everyone's help, thanks

I have a soon 3 years old laptop with a Core i7 920 processor (desktop), triple channel 12 GB RAM, X58 m.board and a Intel X25-M G2 SSD on which FM 12 is installed. I allways run FM with all leagues loaded, and biggest database. I have no problems with that, but I suppose some will not be as patient as I am, with the resulting speed. I'm perfectly fine with it. I haven't experienced a single crash with FM 12 so far.

And no, the velociraptor isn't even close to the speed of a SSD, you are misinformed. It's certainly one of the best of the "regular" hard disks, but far far away from SSD speed.

Drive speed (on platter HD's) effect large data files, the quicker you can get the information to ram and your processor, means less wait time for information to load. This would be why you would notice a difference running windows on a SSD, as there is zero seek time and (dependant on drive) very quick transfer rate. The reason they are not used as a more accessable read and write drive is that they deteriate or become slower the more times the partitions have to be written to.

Running HD's in RAID0 is an efficient and cheap way of getting large HD space with quicker read write times.

Not true. My SSD (soon 3 years old) is as fast now as it was when new. (Yes, regularly monitored with AS SSD, CrystalDiskMark and others). The wear is not noticable, I have still 99% of expected life left.

The same is true with a majority of modern, good reputation SSD's now. My Intel was one of those that got it all right 3 years ago allready, but other manufacturers are now to a large extent on par.

The only reason now to not get a SSD, is price ... or rather price pr. GB. They can't compete with regular spinning disks in that area. In all others, they are clearly much, much better. Even life span - your regular spinning disk will probably have copped out long before a SSD is on the end of it's writeable state. In addition; when a HD dies, it dies. You may get significant problems with restoring your data or transfer them. When a SSD "dies", it's just that you can't write to it any more. It's still perfectly usable as read-only, so you still have acccess to your data.

I have most of my software installed on the SSD, including FM, and have another internal HDD + external to do the "storage". The advantages with FM is quick load and save times, but also the SSD negates what used to be a considerable slowdown as the seasons go on. I get none of that with FM on the SSD. Windows/OS on SSD is important, yes, but by all means - put as much as you can of your regularly used software on it too. The speed of SSD is there to be utilised whenever possible. Spinning HD's ... well, I will not call them obsolete, but they're only good for storage nowadays.

Have a look at this thread:

http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/285828-Football-Manager-12-Benchmark-Thread

Cheers Thomit, I have never used an SSD and was just going buy what I had read, good to get a recommendation from an actual user, very informative. I have though have used RAID0 a lot and like it, probably the next pc I get I will look at a SSD.

Yet most likely in conjunction with platter HD.

Cheers Thomit, I have never used an SSD and was just going buy what I had read, good to get a recommendation from an actual user, very informative. I have though have used RAID0 a lot and like it, probably the next pc I get I will look at a SSD.

Yet most likely in conjunction with platter HD.

With RAID 0 you can get close to the same speed as a SSD in sequential read. That is the reading of large continous data files. Mostly only useful when you copy large files from one place to another. But this sequential read speed is not the main strenght of a SSD, the true strenght is in it's very low seek and access times, it's multi-tasking abilities, and it's speed when dealing with smaller chunks of data (random read/write). This is what is important for Windows or other OS's, and most other software. Regular spin disks, even in RAID, can't get anywhere near SSD's in these areas.

"hard drive speed has nothing to do with it"

i think you'll find it does mate.

"hard drive speed has nothing to do with it"

i think you'll find it does mate.

I would've thought so, particularly if you use logos/facepacks/backgrounds etc... there are countless items stored on your HD that display on every screen. Surely how quickly they load has a huge impact on game speed?

thomit - I sent you a PM but there's nothing in my Sent folder... did you receive it?

thomit - I sent you a PM but there's nothing in my Sent folder... did you receive it?

Yes I did.

hard drive speed has a lot to do with how fast your game loads and saves. how fast the game runs depends on processor and ram.

The slowest point of my game is when it autosaves, a 1GB compressed file does take its time on a HDD.

Ugh ... compressed saves ...

Anyway, I don't even notice the autosaves. I have a 3 file rolling autosave every fortnight, but I never notice a save being done.

When you upload as many bug files to ftp as I do compressed save option is the only way to go, if I didn't they'd take far too long to upload.